"For an oncologist in training, too, leukemia represents a special incarnation of cancer. Its pace, its acuity, its breathtaking, inexorable arc of growth forces rapid, often drastic decisions; it is terrifying to experience, terrifying to observe, and terrifying to treat." Prologue, p. 3

"Cancer was an all-consuming presence in our lives. It invaded our imaginations; it occupied our memories; it infiltrated every conversation, every thought." Prologue, p. 4

"Childhood leukemia had fascinated, confused, and frustrated doctors for more than a century. The disease had been analyzed, classified, subclassified, and divided meticulously; in musty, leather bound books on the library shelves at Children's - Anderson's Pathology or Boyd's Pathology of Internal Diseases - page upon page was plastered with images of leukemia cells and appended with elaborate taxonomies to describe the cells." Part 1, p. 12

"To understand the phenomenon, a scientist must first describe it; to describe it objectively, he must first...